Searching for a Heart

by Tymber Dalton

  Really?

  Except…

  Her phone vibrated in her hand with an incoming e-mail alert. Sure enough, Mr. Gonzales had e-mailed her.

  Job offer for Maddison Nance: Double former pay and double bonus rate to start on Monday or sooner. Employer will pay 100% medical insurance premiums. Free accommodations in luxury suite room. Will also hire spouse at Maddison’s previous salary and full benefits.

  Holy shit.

  Mr. Gonzales might be many things, but he’d never lied to her—or any employee—when it came to matters regarding pay. That was one of the reasons she hadn’t walked away from the job before, because he might have been frustrating on a number of fronts, as well as a spineless weasel, but he wasn’t an outright liar. His word was good.

  He’d worked too hard throughout his life, his mother and father arriving in Florida from Cuba, barely escaping there. He’d always treated employees with respect, whether they were groundskeepers, housekeeping, cooks, desk clerks, or even…

  Her.

  His obvious discomfort with her trans status notwithstanding, it was telling that he was calling her now to save his ass.

  On the other hand, if he hadn’t been greedy and in a hurry to dump the resort after she’d turned it profitable, he wouldn’t be so desperate now. He’d sold it without bothering to tell her that’s what he was doing. Generous severance package or not, she’d been damned lucky to land on her feet and not her ass.

  Plus, there was no guarantee he wouldn’t fuck her over again. Times two, if he was offering Milo a job.

  Still…

  That was a lot of fucking money to walk away from without at least discussing it with Milo.

  She pulled up her ongoing text thread with Milo.

  Are you available right now, Sir?

  She was on her way back to her desk when he replied.

  On a conference call for a while, baby. What’s up?

  Her heart still fluttered when she read that endearment.

  Any endearment he used for her, but especially that one.

  No, there was no way in fucking hell she was ever walking away from Milo.

  I just received an interesting phone call and need to discuss it with you.

  She didn’t even get the phone set on her desk before he replied.

  Do I need to hurt someone?

  That made her smile.

  No, but it’s important. And kind of urgent.

  She didn’t bother setting the phone down. He replied seconds later.

  Come on up. I’ll put my call on mute.

  She grabbed her phone and headed upstairs, feeling a little nervous as she walked past the receptionist, who was on the phone. She smiled and nodded to Maddison but made no move to stop her. Obviously, she knew who Maddison was.

  Everyone knew who she was.

  Since she wasn’t on Milo’s team, and she didn’t report to him, no one at the company had any problem with them being together. There were several other couples in the company.

  He was proud to introduce her as his fiancée, and always had been.

  She paused in his office doorway and waited until he looked up and waved her in. She closed the door behind her and quietly took a seat in one of the chairs in front of his desk because he was currently talking to someone in speaker mode.

  She watched him as he did, focusing on his light green eyes, how they were gorgeous, fern green, not the fake emerald of Jordan Holmes’ eyes.

  Wonder if they let him keep his contacts in lock-up?

  That was a mean thing to think, and she knew it, but she was still trying to process that her instincts had been proven right again.

  Listening to her gut had saved her a world of problems.

  Milo sat back and, in a few minutes, hit the mute button and gave her a smile. “What’s up, baby?”

  After taking a deep breath, she detailed her conversation with Mr. Gonzales and showed him the e-mail on her phone.

  She wasn’t sure she liked the dark expression that narrowed his eyes before he schooled it back into her usual calm, cool Milo.

  “List the pros and cons for me, baby,” he said.

  “Well, pros would be money and benefits, to start with. And he wants to hire you, too.”

  “I don’t know anything about running a resort.”

  “I trust you. I can teach you everything you need to know.”

  He held up a hand while he listened to the call, then hit the unmute button, replied, and muted it again. “I have a job.”

  “It’s a lot of money, Milo.”

  “What about school?”

  “I’ll withdraw, I guess, and transfer to UM.”

  “You sound like you’ve decided.”

  “No, I haven’t. That’s why we’re talking now.”

  “It sounds like there was a lot going on, though. Investigations like that usually take a year or more, and they arrested him this soon? No telling what was going on, but that’s probably why they were so hot to put their own guy in place as soon as possible. Probably laundering money from day one. And why he was so anxious to keep you on, because you were clueless about what they were doing. He probably was going to frame you to look like you were doing it.”

  “Oh. I hadn’t even thought about that.”

  “Which is another point in the Cons column.” She must have looked confused, because he continued. “If they were laundering money through the resort already, there could be legal ramifications there. I don’t want you caught up in a police investigation for something that’s not even your fault.”

  “Ah.” She settled back in her chair. “True. I hadn’t thought about it like that.”

  He glanced at his phone, listening to the conference call for a moment before speaking again. “I’m not quitting my job,” he quietly said. “I love you, but I make decent money. We already ran the budget numbers. If they were a resort here in Sarasota, I’d say okay, sure, why not, after talking to an attorney to make sure it was safe for you to get involved. Even if they were up in St. Pete. But not Miami. That’s not a daily commute kind of drive, baby.”

  “So you’re telling me no?”

  “I’m telling you my vote is no. You are an adult and have to make your own decisions about things like this. I don’t want you hating me later.”

  She stared into his green eyes. “What if I want you to make the decision?” she softly asked.

  Milo studied her for an achingly long moment. “Are you asking me to collar you, baby? Because I won’t make that kind of decision for you unless you’re wearing my collar.”

  “What if I am?”

  He leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers together. “We’re not playing that game,” he quietly said, Sir’s voice making her nipples tighten and her breath catch. “I think I’ve proven myself. Either you trust me, or you don’t. If you want me to collar you, then ask. I’m ready to spend the rest of my life with you. If that doesn’t tell you everything you need to know about me, then I don’t know what does. I can easily spend the rest of my life with you the way we are now. But I will not make that kind of decision for you unless you’ve asked me to collar you as my slave. So if you want me to make it for you, then you know what has to happen.”

  She couldn’t bear the weight of his gaze. Her focus dropped to her hands, which lay clasped in her lap. “That’s a lot of money,” she said.

  “Yes, it is. But you wanted to earn your MBA. Once you have that, you could likely be earning double what you are now here. Or maybe even find a different job in Sarasota. If you take that job, I don’t see how you can continue going to school up here. It’d run you into the ground driving back and forth all the time. It would also mean we don’t get to see each other for a while, because I will not let you give up school for me.”

  She met his gaze again, surprised by that admission.

  Someone was addressing him directly on the call, and he held a finger to his lips in a gentle warning as he hit the unmute button and responded. She
sat there for several minutes, studying him, listening to him, trying to remain still so she didn’t distract him.

  It allowed her to watch him as he focused on the call and not her.

  She loved him.

  With every ounce of her soul, she loved him.

  He loved her, too.

  To him, she was a woman—full stop.

  She wasn’t a fetish to him, wasn’t a novelty, wasn’t a way for him to see if he was questioning his own orientation.

  He was a straight guy who loved her, a straight woman. To him, her factory-built parts were no different than if she had a mole or a scar. She was an entire package to him, not individual parts.

  He finally muted the call again, listening, then his gaze swiveled and met hers.

  Electricity surged through her.

  Isn’t that my answer?

  “We’ll talk about this more tonight,” he said. “You need time to think about this, and I can’t devote the attention to it right now that you deserve.”

  “What if I—”

  “Tonight,” he gently said, tipping his head toward the door. “Love you.” He blew her a kiss.

  But he was still in Sir mode, and she was absolutely not going to start an argument about this at work.

  She blew him a kiss back. “Love you, too.” She stood and left his office, leaving the door open after glancing back for guidance as to how he wanted it.

  Deep inside, the part of her that had felt lonely forever curled up and said nope, no way was she going to take the job. Meanwhile, her logic-brain wanted to argue that she’d likely never see that much money being thrown at her for a long time. In a job she already knew how to do and was qualified to do.

  The two sides of her were equally stubborn and dug in, refusing to budge.

  Meaning she’d need to shelve the discussion until that night, when Milo got home.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Milo was on another conference call when Mads was ready to leave. When she stood in his office doorway, his stomach fought the urge to clench, fear racing through him that she might choose the job over him.

  He gave her a smile and kissed his fingers, waggling them at her, which she returned.

  Sitting back, he closed his eyes and tried not to worry. Tried to focus on his job.

  He wouldn’t force her to choose him. She was an adult, and she needed to make this decision.

  Could he blame her for not refusing immediately?

  No, because that was a lot of money, and she was sixteen years younger than him. If someone had tossed that much money at him back then, he couldn’t swear he’d say no. If their positions were reversed…

  Stop.

  He couldn’t use that argument and damn well knew it. He’d never know what life was like for her before she walked into his. He couldn’t begin to claim to understand all she’d been through.

  All he knew was he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her.

  If that wasn’t good enough for her…well, it was all he had to offer her.

  His love, his faith, his trust.

  But she had to want to be with him. He wouldn’t chase her. He did that with one wife and ended up divorced.

  He also wasn’t sure, if he was truly honest with himself, if he could handle it if she did choose Miami over him. He trusted her, but he didn’t trust what the long distance would do to him over time.

  When he thought about the future and them together, he could easily see ten, twenty, maybe even forty years into the future, if they were lucky. So what if they never had kids? That wasn’t a big deal to him, anyway. If she decided she wanted children, then they could look into adoption or surrogacy.

  Whatever made her happy.

  That’s all he wanted—for her to be happy.

  Even if it meant she’d leave him and rip his heart out in the process.

  * * * *

  Milo didn’t text Maddison when he left work. He needed some time alone to process now that he wasn’t being pulled in ten different directions at once. He stopped by the grocery store and slowly walked every aisle as he checked items off the list on his phone.

  He didn’t mind doing this for her—for them. Shouldering part of the burden so she had more time to study. He was proud of her for going back to school.

  He was proud to call her his fiancée and, hopefully, to soon call her his wife.

  His brother and sister-in-law loved her, and were happy to not say anything to Milo’s parents about Mads being trans, agreeing that it might be better to let that be. Wasn’t any of their business, anyway.

  Mads’ parents seemed to like him, and he’d obviously won over Fen and Joel, too.

  Absolutely he’d love to collar her, but that had to be her choice. She needed to ask him to do it.

  He thought about the gold necklace tucked into the back of his desk at home. The one he wanted to be her day collar.

  He’d never imagined he’d be in the position of wanting to collar someone. Never even realized it was a thing before his eyes had been opened, much less that he’d have someone to collar.

  Since being taken under Eliza and Rusty’s wing—and the collective wings of their other friends in the Suncoast Society—Milo had never felt…happier.

  Satisfied with life.

  At peace with who he was and what he wanted.

  It was okay to want to be in charge in the relationship, as long as your partner wanted that, too, and it was okay to want a partner who felt that way.

  Maybe he wasn’t as hard-core kinky about certain things as some of their friends, but tying Mads up and spanking her gorgeous ass made him hard as a rock.

  Making love to her was the most emotionally satisfying experience he’d ever had with a partner in his entire life.

  The thought of her giving herself to him as his slave filled him with hope he never knew possibly existed.

  Part of him hated that he’d wasted so many years with Linda, but if things hadn’t happened the way they did, he wouldn’t have met Mads.

  And no way would he ever give her up. Not willingly.

  Not unless she told him she didn’t want to be with him anymore.

  When he arrived home, Mads was curled up on the couch with one of her textbooks, and was wearing one of his T-shirts. She started to get up to help him, but he stopped her. “I’ve got it, baby. You study.” He leaned in for a kiss as he passed her.

  He only hoped it wasn’t the first of a dwindling number of times he’d get to kiss her like this, or come home to her waiting for him.

  * * * *

  The way her heart skipped when Milo walked through the front door and kissed her hello settled it. The final nail in the coffin.

  That was after Fen chewed her a new one when she called to ask his opinion.

  What did it say that she didn’t even take it personally when Fen asked what the fuck was wrong with her, and why hadn’t she asked Milo to collar her yet? And, oh, FYI, when was her fricking wedding, because he had a damn bridal shower to plan for her.

  She set her textbook aside and followed him to the kitchen when he came in with the last load of groceries.

  “You should be studying, baby,” he gently chided.

  She hooked her fingers through his belt loops and held him still. “I want you to collar me, Sir,” she said. “Yes, it’s a lot of money, but it’s not worth losing you. Nothing’s worth losing you.”

  He caught her hands and brought them to his lips, kissing them, then pressing them against his chest as he leaned back against the counter. “Are you sure?”

  “I’ve spent my whole life wishing I could find someone to love me, who’d see the real me and love me the way I am. Searching for someone who’d want to sweep me off my feet. Someone who’d love me without sticking an invisible asterisk at the end of my name when introducing me.”

  “Have you told Mr. Gonzales yet?”

  “Yes, Sir. I think I made him cry.”

  Milo smiled. “That’s my good girl.”
r />   A sweet, gentle frisson swept through her. “I can’t imagine life without you. I don’t want to.”

  “I can’t imagine life without you, either.” He pulled her into his arms. “I love you, baby.”

  “I love you, too, Sir.”

  His hands slid down her back, cupping her bare ass where she was naked under his T-shirt. “Shouldn’t someone be studying for their test tomorrow?”

  “I wanted to tell you that first. And I’ll sign a prenup or whatever.”

  “We both need prenups. You’ve got that money from your severance package, and your 401(k).”

  “I don’t think either of us will need it, though. The prenups.” She couldn’t look away from his green gaze. “I want to spend the rest of my life with you.”

  His gaze searched her face. “I want to spend the rest of my life with you, too.” His lips slanted over hers and a soft gasp escaped her. Her lips parted for him without hesitation. Teeth bumping, tasting his warm breath, the feel of Milo’s cock stiffening against her.

  Him. All of him.

  He raised one hand to the back of her head, his fingers tangling in her hair and holding her in place while his mouth completely owned hers, and her.

  Totally.

  She pressed her body against his, everything else falling away around her.

  Lost. That’s what she was, lost in this, in them.

  In him.

  He finally lifted his mouth from hers, but didn’t release her. “You should be studying,” he hoarsely said. “You don’t study tonight, you’ll be cramming during lunch tomorrow.”

  She smiled up at him as she slipped a hand between them so she could palm his cock through his slacks. “I know something else I’d like to cram.”

  A needy moan rumbled through him. “Don’t tempt me, baby. I’ll hogtie you and spend the night making you beg.”

  She smiled up at him and slowly dropped to her knees, nuzzling her face against his bulge through his slacks. “You say that like it’s a bad thing, Sir.”